System Design Interview
Questions and Answers
50 System Design Interview Questions and Answers
Q1: Design a URL Shortener
Use a hash function or base62 encoding to generate short URLs
Store mappings in a database
Handle collisions and expiration.
Q2: Design a Cache System
Use LRU or LFU eviction policies
Choose between in-memory (Redis) or distributed cache
Consider consistency and TTL.
Q3: Design a Rate Limiter
Use token bucket or leaky bucket algorithms
Store counters in Redis or in-memory
Apply per-user or per-IP limits.
Q4: Design Twitter
Focus on fan-out on write vs read, timelines, follower graphs, and media storage Use sharding and caching.
Q5: Design Instagram
Handle photo uploads, feeds, likes, comments
Use CDN for media, NoSQL for metadata, and caching for feeds.
Q6: Design WhatsApp
Real-time messaging via WebSockets, message queues, encryption, and offline delivery
Use distributed databases.
Q7: Design a Notification System
Use push/polling mechanisms, message queues, retry logic, and user preferences.
Q8: Design a File Storage System
Use chunking, metadata indexing, replication, and deduplication
Consider S3-like architecture.
Q9: Design Google Docs
Real-time collaboration via operational transformation or CRDTs
Use WebSockets and versioning.
Q10: Design a Video Streaming Service
Use adaptive bitrate streaming, CDN, encoding pipelines, and metadata indexing.
Q11: Design a Ride-Sharing App
Match riders and drivers using geolocation, ETA algorithms, surge pricing, and real-time updates.
Q12: Design a News Feed
Use ranking algorithms, caching, pagination, and user personalization.
Q13: Design a Search Engine
Use crawling, indexing, ranking algorithms, and distributed storage.
Q14: Design a Payment Gateway
Ensure security, transaction logs, fraud detection, and integration with banks.
Q15: Design a Booking System
Handle availability, concurrency, calendar views, and notifications.
Q16: Design a Chat Application
Use WebSockets, message queues, encryption, and delivery receipts.
Q17: Design a Job Scheduler
Use priority queues, worker threads, retry logic, and logging.
Q18: Design a CDN
Use edge servers, caching strategies, and load balancing.
Q19: Design a Logging System
Use log aggregation, indexing, search, and alerting.
Q20: Design a Metrics Dashboard
Use time-series databases, visualization tools, and alerting.
Q21: Design a Document Collaboration Tool
Use real-time sync, version control, and conflict resolution.
Q22: Design a Polling System
Handle vote counting, concurrency, and result aggregation.
Q23: Design a Leaderboard
Use sorted sets, caching, and real-time updates.
Q24: Design a Recommendation System
Use collaborative filtering, content-based filtering, and ranking.
Q25: Design a Social Network
Handle user profiles, connections, feeds, and privacy settings.
Q26: Design a Multi-Tenant SaaS App
Use tenant isolation, shared resources, and scalability.
Q27: Design a Real-Time Analytics System
Use stream processing, windowing, and dashboards.
Q28: Design a Distributed Locking System
Use Redis or Zookeeper for lock coordination and expiration.
Q29: Design a Feature Flag System
Use toggles, rollout strategies, and audit logs.
Q30: Design a Version Control System
Use DAGs, branching, merging, and conflict resolution.
Q31: Design a Survey Platform
Handle question types, responses, analytics, and exports.
Q32: Design a Task Management App
Use boards, lists, notifications, and user roles.
Q33: Design a Content Moderation System
Use ML models, queues, human review, and audit trails.
Q34: Design a Fraud Detection System
Use anomaly detection, rule engines, and alerts.
Q35: Design a Cloud Storage System
Use replication, encryption, access control, and billing.
Q36: Design a Load Balancer
Use round-robin, least connections, and health checks.
Q37: Design a Queue System
Use FIFO/LIFO, retries, dead-letter queues, and monitoring.
Q38: Design a Video Conferencing App
Use media servers, signaling, STUN/TURN, and recording.
Q39: Design a Document Indexing System
Use inverted indexes, tokenization, and ranking.
Q40: Design a Real-Time Bidding System
Use auctions, latency optimization, and fraud prevention.
Q41: Design a Shopping Cart System
Handle sessions, inventory, pricing, and checkout.
Q42: Design a Loyalty Program
Track points, tiers, rewards, and redemption.
Q43: Design a Multi-Region Deployment
Use replication, failover, latency optimization, and DNS routing.
Q44: Design a Data Pipeline
Use ETL, batch/stream processing, and monitoring.
Q45: Design a Schema Registry
Use versioning, compatibility checks, and metadata.
Q46: Design a Mobile Backend
Use APIs, push notifications, and offline sync.
Q47: Design a Health Monitoring System
Use sensors, alerts, dashboards, and data storage.
Q48: Design a Quiz Platform
Handle question banks, scoring, timing, and analytics.
Q49: Design a Code Execution Engine
Use sandboxing, resource limits, and language support.
Q50: Design a Resume Parser
Use NLP, templates, and structured output.
Crack Top Tech Interviews
Access 100+ Questions & Real-
World Diagrams
Interviews aren’t just about answers—they’re about
clarity, confidence, and the ability to map real-world problems.
Our Premium Tech Resources bundle gives you 100+ curated questions,
architecture diagrams, and a mentorship session tailored to your goals.